THEOBALD, NORMAN, NEWMAN / Journal <strong>of</strong> Conservation Planning Vol 6 (2010) 1—20park (west <strong>of</strong> the Continental Divide) is slightly lessaccessible, with an average one-way travel time <strong>of</strong> 3.8hours, while it is 3.4 hours on the east side. The mostaccessible ecological systems were savannah (2.0 hrs)and lower montane (2.3 hrs). Note that these values areaverages for the entire zones — there are some parts <strong>of</strong>each <strong>of</strong> these systems that are much more (and less)accessible than the average value.Our second objective was to examine how <strong>accessibility</strong>changed with different scenarios <strong>of</strong> transportationinfrastructure (Figures 2, 3, and 4, on pages 9, 10, and 11respectively). Table 5, page 12, shows that we found thataverage travel time increases from 3.5 (with roads andtrails) to 3.9 (no trails but roads) to 7.4 hours (no roads ortrails). We also examined the <strong>accessibility</strong> <strong>of</strong> threeResearch Natural Areas (RNA; Table 6, page 12) — setaside to protect their pristine nature and to serve asreference. Travel time to West Creek RNA (located in theeastern part <strong>of</strong> the park, north <strong>of</strong> the Town <strong>of</strong> Estes Park)increases from 4.8 to 5.8 hours (Scenarios A and C,respectively) suggesting that it is relatively accessiblebeca<strong>use</strong> <strong>of</strong> its geographic location within the park, notbeca<strong>use</strong> <strong>of</strong> the existence <strong>of</strong> any internal transportationinfrastructure. In contrast, travel time to SpecimenMountain RNA (located in the northwest corner <strong>of</strong> RMNP)increases from 3.2 to 10.5 hours (Scenarios A and C),showing that <strong>accessibility</strong> has changed substantially withrecent transportation infrastructure.Our third objective was to illustrate how <strong>accessibility</strong>could be <strong>use</strong>d to inform a pressing management concern:for example, the spread <strong>of</strong> invasive species. Figure 5,page 13, shows the 1,290 randomly-located vegetationplots from the RMNP vegetation dataset (Salas et al.2005) placed over the <strong>accessibility</strong> surface (Scenario A).The average time to plots that contain cheat grass was0.86 hrs (SD=0.432), while the plots without cheat grasswere 3.24 hours away (SD=9.1; Figure 6, page 14).Cheat grass occurs in more accessible <strong>areas</strong> — roughly80% <strong>of</strong> plots with cheat grass are within one hour’s traveltime.Our final objective was to compare <strong>accessibility</strong> tomeasures <strong>of</strong> human <strong>use</strong> that were calculated using roadand trail density or distance from roads. Figure 7, page15, shows the “human <strong>use</strong> intensity” metric (Schumacheret al. 2000) for RMNP, with the town <strong>of</strong> Estes Park clearlyvisible in the right side (east) <strong>of</strong> the park, and moreremote <strong>areas</strong> shown <strong>by</strong> a low density <strong>of</strong> <strong>use</strong>. Nearly 50%<strong>of</strong> the park has a <strong>use</strong> intensity value <strong>of</strong> 0.0 (i.e. no <strong>use</strong>),even though some <strong>of</strong> these <strong>areas</strong> are just beyond 1 kmfrom a road or trail. Moreover, human <strong>use</strong> intensity doesnot differentiate locations that are either close to or farfrom the entrances to the park. Figure 8, page 16, showsa map that compares human <strong>use</strong> intensity values basedon road and trail density to travel time as a ratio <strong>of</strong> theranked values. This shows that in general the human <strong>use</strong>intensity metric over-estimates impacts in developed/urban <strong>areas</strong>, while it under-estimates impacts in <strong>areas</strong>close to, but not on, roads and trails (as compared to<strong>accessibility</strong>).Figures 9 and 10, page 17, show the measures <strong>of</strong> impactas a proportion <strong>of</strong> the front country and back countrymanagement zones. The vast majority (~95%) <strong>of</strong> theproportion <strong>of</strong> the front country zone has low (
THEOBALD, NORMAN, NEWMAN / Journal <strong>of</strong> Conservation Planning Vol 6 (2010) 1—20FIGURE 2 Accessibility within RMNP from park entrances, assumingcurrent transportation infrastructure (Scenario A), shown as one-waytravel time assuming shortest travel time along roads, trails, and <strong>of</strong>f-trail.9
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